1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a digital timing circuit, and more particularly to a timing circuit in a digital wristwatch for displaying both hours and minutes information sequentially by using a two digit display.
2. Description of the Prior Art
In the art, digital watches have used four display elements to display the horological information. Usually, two of the display elements display the hours and the other two display elements display the minutes; either liquid crystal or light emitting diode (LED) display elements have been used.
In order to construct a ladies' digital watch, the size of the watch and its electronics must be reduced considerably, as compared to the men's digital watch for aesthetic reasons. One of the major limiting factors in the size of the digital watch is that four display elements have been necessary to display the horological information. In the present invention, though, the width of the digital watch can be reduced to almost half that of the prior art digital watches because only two display elements instead of the four display elements are used.
The digital timing circuit of the present invention allows a digital watch to be constructed, using only two display elements instead of the prior art four display elements, by displaying the time in a sequential manner, first the hours and then the minutes when said circuit is activated by a push button. Also, the digital timing circuit allows the hours information to be displayed as long as the push button is depressed and then the minutes information after releasing the push button.